


To Die Unnamed

by drelfina



Series: The Reckoning: Symbol of Subjugation Inspired [1]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Attempted Suicide, Culture about names, Founders Era, Gen, I had feels, Names in culture, Other Uchiha OCs, Possible Suicide Ideation, Senju vs Uchiha, Tragedy, Uchiha OC I stole from Perelka_L oops, Uchiha OCs - Freeform, What does it mean to have worth?, please be safe when reading, strategies of war, subtle hints of abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-27
Updated: 2020-01-27
Packaged: 2021-02-27 06:40:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 903
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22432744
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/drelfina/pseuds/drelfina
Summary: You owe it to the Clan.You oweeverythingto the Clan.Inspired byChapter 12 of Evocates'A symbol of subjugation.
Series: The Reckoning: Symbol of Subjugation Inspired [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1649584
Comments: 29
Kudos: 223





	To Die Unnamed

**Author's Note:**

  * For [evocates](https://archiveofourown.org/users/evocates/gifts).
  * Inspired by [a symbol of subjugation](https://archiveofourown.org/works/21368578) by [evocates](https://archiveofourown.org/users/evocates/pseuds/evocates). 



> I was still thinking really hard about the chapter 12 of evocates' a symbol of subjugation, and the sudden revelation I had about names in the light of the chapter 12 and ... uh an earlier chapter where Mito was talking about herself and her place within the Clan. 
> 
> So this is for Evocates.

When you were cornered, you knew it was the end. 

A full squad of Uchiha, all of them tall. 

Incredible reach, your training reminded you; if you're faced with taller stronger opponents, your advantage was speed. You were small, and most of all, _quick_. 

But they were Uchiha. 

Anyone else, even the Inuzuka, you could outrun, and you had strategies to throw off their ninken. 

But not Uchiha. 

Uchiha were monstrous in their abilities, monstrous in their passions, bled fire in their breath. 

It wasn't so much exaggerated stories as reality on the battlefield. 

This is the first time, still, that the battlefield feels unsafe. 

You tried to run anyway. 

You knew what it meant, to fail. You had to try. You had to try, like Touka-nee did. You had to try, like Tobira-nii did, because if you didn't _try_... 

you might as well have laid down and given up, and the scroll burned inside your pocket, a weight against your side, and you had to try anyway. 

You weren't the sensor that Tobira-nii was. Is. You weren't anything much at all, but at least this much, you could do, this much, could earn your place in the Clan. 

And this much... you had to do. 

( _"There is no try. You do, or you fail."_ ) 

There was a scoring against your back, the armour taking the hit, and you ran. Faster. Burning air in your lungs - 

Air was literally burning all around you. 

But behind you, there were near silent steps, and the singing of metal in fire. 

Fire behind you, fire so close, and your fuuton wasn't anywhere near as good as it could have been, because you had been running missions instead of training, because Tobira-nii had been away in Uzushio and there had been no one to train _with_ , to get _better_. 

Sweat ran down your cheeks, and you knew that you had no chance. 

(Is there any real chance) 

You couldn't get out, couldn't get away from the ring of fire burning air up, but. 

But maybe you can try to take one of them down. 

It took them by surprise. 

You thought, you maybe had a chance, then, that you, small useless you, would turn and bite, but then, even cornered mice would bite a snake, so if nothing else, you had to give back as hard as you can, and make the loss of the scroll, if not wasted, then at least paid for, in Uchiha blood. 

"The _fuck_ , he's a chi-"

A scream. 

Your teeth were bloody, your fist wet with blood. 

You kept moving, you couldn't stop. 

(Stop and you die, unnamed, unworthy.) 

But they were fast. 

They had reach, they had speed, and like all Uchiha did, they had _fire_. 

And eventually you ended it on your knees, staring up at the monsters with red eyes and knew. 

You had failed. 

So you knew what you had to do. 

It was two seconds to ignite the pouch with the scroll - a failed mission was a failed mission, but _how_ it failed was important too, and the Uchiha blood they spent to get it would be meagre but almost acceptable payment. 

And you raised your kunai. 

But then a blade across your throat ended it. Faster than you could have done, yourself.

* * *

"... this one. This one was Senju Kawarama, wasn't it?" 

Uchiha Shurama felt sick. his throat closing in as he took in the kid's body. 

Armour that fit him, but he was younger than his own daughter. His own daughter who still played with dolls, not yet kunai, and this child had moved to protect whatever he'd been carrying in his pouch. 

"Yes," Shurama said. "It's Butsuma's son." 

one of the younger ones. The - the _vulnerable_ ones. 

What would they have done, if the kid had begged?

Tenshi was sick in a corner. Shurama blocked out the sound, leaned in to make himself check. 

The kid's grip on his kunai had been specific. His sharingan had recorded it for all eternity, was still recording it. 

Senju Kawarama had been about to kill himself rather than beg for his life. 

(what if they had just kept him a hostage? what if ...) 

But Tajima-sama had said , looking as pale and ill in the face as Shurama was feeling right now, that they had to give Senju Butsuma a warning. 

And it made them monsters indeed. 

(But what did it mean, to put a child in child-sized armour, and running adult-manned missions?) 

"Why didn't he ask," Hoshi asked, weak, thready, sounding like he could barely hold it in himself, despite him being the one to have taken the brunt of the kid's vicious attack. "Why didn't he ask for us to spare his _life_?" 

"I don't know," Shurama said. He was team leader. He knew the strategy. "We don't have to do this. Again." 

Butsuma had to - had to _stop_. At least a little, from the pain of losing his young child. 

"It's nothing personal, kid," he said down to the body. It wasn't personal. It was war. 

It wasn't right to leave the body like this, in case scavengers got at it, so he was the one to carefully strip the boy of his armour, take his identifying headband, and then just as carefully burn the body. 

It wasn't personal. 

It wasn't. 

But he knew he had no right to hold his daughter, not anymore. 

END

**Author's Note:**

> What does it mean to die unnamed? 
> 
> The point here is that if one reads a symbol of subjugation carefully, one notices that many Uchiha OCs have names, fleshed out lives, and personalities, but there literally are no named non-main character Senju. Evocates has a reason for it lol and it's basically in Mito's POV chapter way back when she was thinking about her place in the SEnju Clan. 
> 
> but mainly, I realised that no other Senju not only was NAMED, they literally, to the Narrator, had not EARNED A PLACE IN THE CLAN. They had not earned their right to be named by the Narrator. 
> 
> Touka and Mito, Tobira and Hashi had. 
> 
> The only other named SEnju were Butsuma, Kawarama and Itama. And technically the two younger brothers were only named by Tobirama and Hashirama - not by Mito and Touka. They had not earned their names and places to anyone else in the Senju. 
> 
> That is fucking TRAGIC (and abusive as hell) 
> 
> so you can tell by my choice of POV. 
> 
> And guess who actually named Kawarama, in the end? 
> 
> (aSoS!Tajima's gambit, horrendous as it is, failed. and he'd probably never be able to live with himself for it)
> 
> * * *
> 
> Names in East ASian culture is highly important - it's gotten less so... uh, messy in more recent years for modern China and other Chinese communities, but since we're all in an anime fandom, I'm sure you've noticed that honorifics are very important, as are actual titles like Senpai, sensei, taishou, hokage-sama, etc. if you read A Symbol of Subjugation a bit closer, titles are also extremely important. in Heian Japan (and possibly others), some people were literally just named BY their titles and nothing else, which can seem very strange to the Western ear. 
> 
> In the chapter 12 of the fic, and in this work, since names are SO important and literally tell you about your place and worth in the Senju Clan, the fact that you had to earn your name, even as a child, is very, very telling. 
> 
> THis, by the way, is a show of _abusiveness_ of the cultural structure IN that time-period. But because it is so SUBTLE, it can go unnoticed by the unobservant, unless you yourself had been subject to or had learned to observe such traits of abuse. 
> 
> This has nothing to do with fucking Zetsu.


End file.
